Thought for the Evening: Allegorical Reading of Poetry
One of the Confucian Classics is the Classic of Odes or Classic of Poetry. Confucius himself praised it highly, and seems at the very least to regard it as an essential source for learning how to speak well; but because he also says at one point that 'it does not deviate', he was generally interpreted as suggesting that it is a storehouse of moral guidance. It is perhaps not always immediately obvious how this works; for instance, Ode 87 is a woman singing (literally) about lifting her dress so she can cross a river, and seems to press this risqué image for all its erotic potential: she is willing to lift her skirts for a man if he desires her, but if not, is he really the only one available? But Confucian commentators might read it as a describing a political situation in which the lovers are two states, and the relationship one in which a weaker state needs help and guidance from a stronger state.
The Platonists read Homer allegorically. Thus Circe turning Odysseus's men to beasts would be read as describing the tendency of vice to make us less than properly human. A good summary of this way of interpreting the Circe story, for instance, is found preserved in Boethius (Consolation of Philosophy, Book IV, meter 3); that this long predates Boethius in some form is strongly suggested by occasional other comments we have.
The Song of Songs, Shir ha-Shirim, also known as the Song of Solomon, is an erotic poem, but it was compared by the Rabbi Akiba to the Holy of Holies. The rabbis interpreted it as a parable describing the relationship between God and Israel. (This manner of reading it, of course, is found also in Christians, who have often read it as a description of the relationship between God and the Church.)
In the modern West, it has become common to treat such readings as 'misreadings' or 'abuses' of the text, and allegorical readings are not fashionable among us. But I think it's important to recognize how utterly abnormal this is; to refuse to allegorize is artificial. In cultures in which poetry plays an important role -- and particularly an important role in 'how to speak', to put it in Confucian terms -- allegorical readings of poetry arise spontaneously. Refusing to read poetry allegorically at all requires regularly squashing this tendency. Allegorical reading requires nothing but a sense of how something can be a metaphor for something else, which people generally have to some degree; refusing to read allegorically requires walking an extremely fine line in which one recognizes the figurative character of the poem but takes the figurative language of a poem to be only a little bit figurative -- little figures of speech not extended 'too' far. This is not a target that can easily be hit without a lot of practice.
Of course, none of this is to say that people don't disagree with allegorical readings -- contrary to what is sometimes assumed, allegorical readings are not arbitrary but reasoned -- and even with respect to the three highly allegorized texts above (Shijing, Odyssey, Shir ha-Shirim), you get occasional spurts of skepticism about allegorical readings, and occasional phases in which people focus more on less allegorical readings. But there is a gap between these kinds of criticism and skepticism and refusing outright to recognize the power of a poem to describe large sections of human life.
Related Evening Note: Mythology as a Guide for Morals
Various Links of Interest
* Helen De Cruz discusses the role of awe in scientific inquiry.
* An interesting in-depth discussion of a worrisome recent trend, namely, the tendency of corporations and businesses to divide along partisan lines.
* Amod Lele, The Consolations and Pleasures of Philosophy
* Cameron Harwick, It's Not Socialism, It's Clientelism
* Alison Cobbe, Frances Power Cobbe and Nineteenth-Century Moral Philosophy
* Medieval London is an online exhibit giving a picture of what life was like in a medieval city. Medieval Londoners is a database for actual people we know to have lived in medieval London.
* Sarah Hutton, The Cambridge Platonists, at the SEP
Stephen Phillips, Gaṅgeśa
* Frederick Douglass's oration on Abraham Lincoln, given at the unveiling of The Freedmen's Monument in Washington, DC. The Freedmen's Monument was paid for in commemoration of Lincoln by freed slaves, some of whom devoted significant portions of their first income as free men and women to the project. It was one of the monuments targeted in the recent spate of memorial vandalism, because some people think that the slave thus depicted looks like he's kneeling to Lincoln -- which is not true, he is beginning to rise, his chains having been broken, but people see in statues what they have trained themselves to see, in one way or another. The copy of it in, I think, Boston, was taken down for this reason. In any case, the DC one was protected by Washington's rather active community of Black History tour guides and re-enactors until barricades could be put around it. For myself, the fact that it is a monument to emancipation paid for by emancipated slaves themselves makes it as close to sacred as a secular monument can be, and tearing it down one of the worst forms of arrogance, and treating 'racial justice' as an excuse for tearing it down an obvious lie; but it's sometimes difficult to explain this to people who hold nothing sacred at all. Regardless, Douglass's oration is one of the most measured and laudatory eulogies of Lincoln imaginable -- fully recognizing his limitations, but giving him a kind of praise that is among the highest forms of praise a human being can receive.
* Robert Post, The Incomparable Chief Justiceship of William Howard Taft (PDF)
* Sianne Ngai, The Gimmick of the Novel of Ideas. Ngai is usually considered a literary theorist, and I think her work is often uneven, but at its best it's some of the best work in aesthetics done today.
* Andy Smarick, Why Statecraft Is Still Soulcraft
* July 9 was the 123rd anniversary of Venerable Augustus Tolton's death.
Currently Reading
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes
Lucretius, On the Nature of Things
Yuri Slezkine, The House of Government
Hannah Arendt, Totalitarianism
Monday, July 13, 2020
Sunday, July 12, 2020
Mission San Gabriel
The Mission San Gabriel Arcángel was founded by the Franciscans in 1771, although the current building was built in 1776 after the original was destroyed by a flood. It was a church until 1834, when it fell into disuse, and was then restored by the Claretians beginning in 1862. It is one of the most important historic church buildings in California. Early Saturday morning, around 4 am, it was in flames; the roof has been destroyed and much of the church interior by the fire. Contrary to the somewhat misleading AP report, the mission was not itself founded by St. Junipero Serra, although he was president of missions and thus supervisor for those who did found it; but the mission has had repeated problems the past few years with their statue of St. Junipero being vandalized, and given the recent spate of vandalism against memorials (including several statues of St. Junipero elsewhere), they recently moved the statue to protect it.
It is at present unclear whether the fire was accidental or arson. Either way, it is a great misfortune.
Perhaps I should take some time to listen again to the "Christmas at Mission San Gabriel" episode of The Romance of the Ranchos (found here at #16).
ADDED LATER: The parish is collecting donations for its Fire Restoration Fund.
ADDED LATER 2: It looks like some good news is that almost all paintings and artifacts had been removed to allow some renovating before the mission's 250th anniversary next year. The investigation has so far indicated that the fire started in the choir loft, but isn't giving more than that yet.
It is at present unclear whether the fire was accidental or arson. Either way, it is a great misfortune.
Perhaps I should take some time to listen again to the "Christmas at Mission San Gabriel" episode of The Romance of the Ranchos (found here at #16).
ADDED LATER: The parish is collecting donations for its Fire Restoration Fund.
ADDED LATER 2: It looks like some good news is that almost all paintings and artifacts had been removed to allow some renovating before the mission's 250th anniversary next year. The investigation has so far indicated that the fire started in the choir loft, but isn't giving more than that yet.
Saturday, July 11, 2020
Two Poem Drafts
Waiting
The world is waiting; I'm at home;
through endless hours, I am alone;
but all my thoughts are in the sky
where sings the sun its songs of light,
and there my soul will gently float
above great lands no man has known
as I am holding one simple truth,
that I am waiting for you.
When evening shadows grow long and dark
there shines within one blazing star;
the sun's light fades and day will pass,
but I remain and I will last
for my eye seeks the distant line
to find the one I have in mind --
and so I look, with hope imbued:
for I am waiting for you.
Present Tense
the present is not an instant
but a blur
not a note but a whir
not near but ever distant
and something we defer
when we are future
it is past
forward-looking
on it runs
when we are passing
it will last
it is mere portent
when we endure
all unstable
ever sure
and in the doing it is done
The world is waiting; I'm at home;
through endless hours, I am alone;
but all my thoughts are in the sky
where sings the sun its songs of light,
and there my soul will gently float
above great lands no man has known
as I am holding one simple truth,
that I am waiting for you.
When evening shadows grow long and dark
there shines within one blazing star;
the sun's light fades and day will pass,
but I remain and I will last
for my eye seeks the distant line
to find the one I have in mind --
and so I look, with hope imbued:
for I am waiting for you.
Present Tense
the present is not an instant
but a blur
not a note but a whir
not near but ever distant
and something we defer
when we are future
it is past
forward-looking
on it runs
when we are passing
it will last
it is mere portent
when we endure
all unstable
ever sure
and in the doing it is done
Catcher in the Rye
Twitter is mostly useless, and everybody on it usually sounds stupid, but as I pretty much have to force myself occasionally to wade through the Twitter accounts of my colleagues in order to see (amidst many very groanworthy jokes, pointless memes, and uninformed political opinions that are exactly like everyone else's uninformed political opinions but stated in a much more lecturing and indignant tone) what people are reading and recommending -- since I have to do this anyway, I have to take time to enjoy the rare great tweet I come across. This tweet was the one that made today's Twitter-skimming bearable.
Oh, my god. pic.twitter.com/KkTLX8pEi6
— Michael (@michaelcollado) July 10, 2020
Friday, July 10, 2020
Dashed Off XV
There is no argument for pleasure being a good that does not make survival a greater good.
the principle of benignity: "in penal matters the more benign interpretation must be followed" (Regula Iuris 49)
idea -- diremption -- conciliation
The administrative state is the child of colonial empire.
In a modern republic, every consensus has a built-in obsolescence.
the dedication of a a church as teaching the graces of baptism (symbolic baptism)
"the work of the ministries of God should be rational" (Hugh of St. Victor)
If you won't let people be honest, you get lies, not conversions.
"The heart of man is not compound of lies, / but draws some wisdom from the only Wise, / and still recalls him." Tolkien
Human freedom can only reach its complete form cooperatively, and not in a vague and abstract cooperation -- one person with another.
It is in human nature to share autonomy.
having less suffering vs. enjoying less suffering
The ultimate absurdity of mental epiphenomenalism is that it tries to be dualistic and materialistic simultaneously.
Intent is often the only difference between sin and tragedy.
Will is the subject, but reason the cause, of freedom.
One must always oppose the notion that only the individual is natural.
classification → order → final causes
"perceived order proves intention, and unperceived order does not exclude it" Maistre
The errors of the modern age repeatedly come to wreck on this solid rock, that there are holy things.
"Every day one says, this is a hypocrite; but why therefore, when it suffices to say, this is a man?" Maistre
to do one's best and pray to God for the rest
The Zeitgeist doesn't need to organize to propagandize; its propaganda is part of ordinary interaction.
the underbabble of language, implicit in the more-or-less common corpus known by speakers
All adjectives imply a reason.
Dvaita: God and soul are distinct; Shuddhadvaita: They are not both independent, but God has absolute primacy; Dvaitadvaita: The union is intimate without eliminating distinction; Achintya Bheda Abheda: God works in and through creation; Vishishtadvaita: the relation of creature-united-to-God is found in devotion.
As milk unaware works to nourish the calf, the physical works to support the intellect.
Stare decisis implies that change should be justified by the appropriate authorities, and not much else.
Randomness is relative to unit chosen -- e.g., random series vs. random element in series vs. random selection from a group of series.
articulable familiarity
Every genius has something of the ploddingly tenacious.
defensive self-victimization
A common problem with etiological theories of biological function is that they require an etiological theory of health (i.e., adequate functioning).
adequation of organ to function
Any argument for rejecting skill as an efficient cause (as Aristotle makes it) would be an argument for rejecting software (an imitation of skill) as an efficient cause.
temperance : self :: friendliness : others
symbol consequentialism
the 'hypercompetent bad man with one morally good reason' pattern in action movies
To say a sacrament works ex opere operato is to say God is operatively present in it.
In the sacrament, grace proceeds from the res through the sign.
fight choreography in movies as symbolic competence
Poets can make use of deviations because, seeing the whole, they can correct back and thus can both selectively deviate and selectively return.
Economic planning by the government tends to solidify the status of the laborer as a commodity. There are things that can compensate for this, but it does not change the underlying tendency to make workers subserve exchanges.
State economic planning turns the whole economy into a factory-system for producing abstract nubmres, and the laborer a cog in that number-producing machine.
Economics-based politics is not generally about money but about the use of money to redistribute status according to some antecedent scheme.
the alienation of human self-governance
the Consolation of Philosophy as a study in the alienation of happiness
You can only be fulfilled in your work if the working expresses appropriately the tendency to happiness and if through the working one acts in union with that which constitutes happiness.
The point of infallibility is not certainty as such but protection from dangerous error.
"the reservation of the priesthood to males, as a sign of Christ the Spouse who gives himself in the Eucharist" Francis, Evangelii gaudium
The purpose of a cross-examination in court is to display the argument, not get answers from the witness; the latter is only the means, and the best cross-examinations are structure so that it doens't matter what precisely the witness says.
a planning counterpart to PSR: everything can be taken into account in some kind of planning
"Boredom is the demonic pantheism." Kierkegaard
holy water : penitence for past :: holy salt : caution for future (Hugh of St. Victor)
As Christian life has faith, hope, and love, so Christian marriage has fidelity, hope of progeny, and sacramental bond.
Vainglory makes God to be among our enemies; envy makes all our neighbors, even those with good will to us, to be our enemies; wrath makes us enemies to ourselves. Sloth makes us slaves to what is unpleasant; avarice, gluttony, and lust make us slaves to what is pleasant.
"Nirgunam means that the attributes which relate the Infinite to the finite are not necessary to His being. For example, Creatorhood is not an intrinsic attribute of the Divine Nature." Brahmabandhav Upadhyaya
"He is Sat -- existing by Himself; He is Chit -- self-knowledge, knowing Himself without any external intervention; He is Anandam -- supremely happy in His self-colloquy."
"The knowing God is mirrored as the kown God in the ocean of Chit."
"When we have a dream, we make the objects an events we dream about to be possessed of independent existence, whereas they are merely the product of our brain. In like manner, when perceiving this external world through the sense we imagine it to be an independent reality, existing by itself and not as the product of the Divine Mind and Will, then verily our perception of the world may be fitly styled a dream. And it is exactly in this sense and only to this extent that the Vedanta likens the world to a dream."
Love emanates joy by reflecting on itself.
maya as being-from-will
The rich will always capture some portion of any advantage one tries to give the poor, because the rich are always in a better position to play the game for advantages than the poor are.
In Kipling, the Gods of the Market make three false promises: Peace without force; Life without restraint, and Prosperity without work.
Thinking politically and factionally comes so easy to human beings that we cannot consistently transcend the political and the factional without the four cardinal virtues.
Our actions are not merely affected by our desires but by the inertia that has to be overcome to pursue them.
three signs of tyranny: forcing people to violate the laws of religion; imposing taxes arbitrarily; preventing the political participation of the people
to participate in humanitarian traditions in such a way that the participation is a prayer
Christianity is
(1) corporate: Our
(2) familial: Father
(3) spiritual: who art in heaven
(4) directed to God: hallowed by Thy name
(5) evangelistic: Thy kingdom come
(6) historical: Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven
-- our petitions as individuals and small groups always occur within this context and with this understood
The fetus (a) belongs to the mother as part of her and from her; (b) belongs to the father as from him; and (c) has personal rights in his or her own right.
overlapping personal spheres and shared rights
self-harm // self-deception
Human beings do not merely have capabilities, they use them for ends according to the exercise of their rational capacities.
'Capitalism' is not itself a cause; when effects are attributed to it, they are always the effects of particular institutions or practices that are being classified as capitalistic, or else people are just making things up for rhetorical effect.
Societies are layers of classifications of activities.
the negotiation interpretation of logic and the impartial middleman
the ironic standpoint as the indefinite negative
Kirkegaard's Philosophical Fragments is an argument that any conception of truth beyond the Socratic starts to look Christian.
A truth can be viewed aesthetically, ethically, politically, religiously, etc.
an ethical commonwealth not merely governed by moral law but adequate to its sublimity
articulated premises + unarticulated/loosely articulated premises = probable inference
- the residual as capturable in terms of tendency (final) vs in terms of structural analogy (formal)
- the asserted vs the expected
"Bad poetry is false, I grant; but nothing is truer than true poetry." Peirce
The experience of the present is permeated by past and future; nothing is experienced as present except in light of memory and anticipation.
intelligibility ( referentiality ( functionality ( purpose
The ruling class in every epoch steals their ruling ideas from elsewhere. They do not arise from the material relations of the ruling class to others, which is why more or less the same groups are so often in the ruling class both before and after ideological revolutions. They assimilate the justifications of the invaders, or of the most stable institutions, or of whatever is convenient.
"No conclusion is trustworthy which has not been tried by enemy as well as friend; no traditions have a claim upon us which shrink from criticism, and dare not look a rival in the face." Newman
Feminist philosophy is a branch of history of philosophy as a discipline.
-- Charles Williams's suggestion that post-Reichenbach Falls Holmes is really Moriarty (in his review of Roberts's Dr. Watson)
Poetry is the preeminent form of language as mediation.
The primary purpose of courts is to provide public record of reasoning in decisions about law.
like Heimdallr
the human mind has nine mothers,
a shining god
upon a steed of burning gold
the liturgy as the symbolic depiction of the true common good
social media as general 'consciousness-raising'
-- never-ending 'clicks of recognition'
Everybody is put upon by somebody.
Inference to the best explanation requires prior establishment of possibility and of ability to explain.
"The great instrument of propagating moral truth is personal knowledge." Newman
"It may be true that the law cannot change the heart, but it can restrain the heartless." MLK, Jr.
Autonomy is something that must be grown into.
"The Catholic saints alone confess sin, because the Catholic saints alone see God." Newman
The test of whether you are really acting in righteous indignation rather than mere wrath is the golden rule.
in Euthyphro, the link between piety and making others better before the gods
superlegal, contralegal, and preterlegal forms of acting in a legal context
The indelible character makes us channels of grace.
the sacraments as templates of holiness
the principle of benignity: "in penal matters the more benign interpretation must be followed" (Regula Iuris 49)
idea -- diremption -- conciliation
| personal identity arguments | arguments for immortality of soul |
| experience of continuity | near-death experience |
| memory | recollection |
| I (substantiality) | simplicity |
| priority of person | immateriality |
| moral law | moral law |
| natural desire | natural desire |
The administrative state is the child of colonial empire.
In a modern republic, every consensus has a built-in obsolescence.
the dedication of a a church as teaching the graces of baptism (symbolic baptism)
"the work of the ministries of God should be rational" (Hugh of St. Victor)
If you won't let people be honest, you get lies, not conversions.
"The heart of man is not compound of lies, / but draws some wisdom from the only Wise, / and still recalls him." Tolkien
Human freedom can only reach its complete form cooperatively, and not in a vague and abstract cooperation -- one person with another.
It is in human nature to share autonomy.
having less suffering vs. enjoying less suffering
The ultimate absurdity of mental epiphenomenalism is that it tries to be dualistic and materialistic simultaneously.
Intent is often the only difference between sin and tragedy.
Will is the subject, but reason the cause, of freedom.
One must always oppose the notion that only the individual is natural.
classification → order → final causes
"perceived order proves intention, and unperceived order does not exclude it" Maistre
The errors of the modern age repeatedly come to wreck on this solid rock, that there are holy things.
"Every day one says, this is a hypocrite; but why therefore, when it suffices to say, this is a man?" Maistre
to do one's best and pray to God for the rest
The Zeitgeist doesn't need to organize to propagandize; its propaganda is part of ordinary interaction.
the underbabble of language, implicit in the more-or-less common corpus known by speakers
All adjectives imply a reason.
Dvaita: God and soul are distinct; Shuddhadvaita: They are not both independent, but God has absolute primacy; Dvaitadvaita: The union is intimate without eliminating distinction; Achintya Bheda Abheda: God works in and through creation; Vishishtadvaita: the relation of creature-united-to-God is found in devotion.
As milk unaware works to nourish the calf, the physical works to support the intellect.
Stare decisis implies that change should be justified by the appropriate authorities, and not much else.
Randomness is relative to unit chosen -- e.g., random series vs. random element in series vs. random selection from a group of series.
articulable familiarity
Every genius has something of the ploddingly tenacious.
defensive self-victimization
A common problem with etiological theories of biological function is that they require an etiological theory of health (i.e., adequate functioning).
adequation of organ to function
Any argument for rejecting skill as an efficient cause (as Aristotle makes it) would be an argument for rejecting software (an imitation of skill) as an efficient cause.
temperance : self :: friendliness : others
symbol consequentialism
the 'hypercompetent bad man with one morally good reason' pattern in action movies
To say a sacrament works ex opere operato is to say God is operatively present in it.
In the sacrament, grace proceeds from the res through the sign.
fight choreography in movies as symbolic competence
Poets can make use of deviations because, seeing the whole, they can correct back and thus can both selectively deviate and selectively return.
Economic planning by the government tends to solidify the status of the laborer as a commodity. There are things that can compensate for this, but it does not change the underlying tendency to make workers subserve exchanges.
State economic planning turns the whole economy into a factory-system for producing abstract nubmres, and the laborer a cog in that number-producing machine.
Economics-based politics is not generally about money but about the use of money to redistribute status according to some antecedent scheme.
the alienation of human self-governance
the Consolation of Philosophy as a study in the alienation of happiness
You can only be fulfilled in your work if the working expresses appropriately the tendency to happiness and if through the working one acts in union with that which constitutes happiness.
The point of infallibility is not certainty as such but protection from dangerous error.
"the reservation of the priesthood to males, as a sign of Christ the Spouse who gives himself in the Eucharist" Francis, Evangelii gaudium
The purpose of a cross-examination in court is to display the argument, not get answers from the witness; the latter is only the means, and the best cross-examinations are structure so that it doens't matter what precisely the witness says.
a planning counterpart to PSR: everything can be taken into account in some kind of planning
"Boredom is the demonic pantheism." Kierkegaard
holy water : penitence for past :: holy salt : caution for future (Hugh of St. Victor)
As Christian life has faith, hope, and love, so Christian marriage has fidelity, hope of progeny, and sacramental bond.
Vainglory makes God to be among our enemies; envy makes all our neighbors, even those with good will to us, to be our enemies; wrath makes us enemies to ourselves. Sloth makes us slaves to what is unpleasant; avarice, gluttony, and lust make us slaves to what is pleasant.
"Nirgunam means that the attributes which relate the Infinite to the finite are not necessary to His being. For example, Creatorhood is not an intrinsic attribute of the Divine Nature." Brahmabandhav Upadhyaya
"He is Sat -- existing by Himself; He is Chit -- self-knowledge, knowing Himself without any external intervention; He is Anandam -- supremely happy in His self-colloquy."
"The knowing God is mirrored as the kown God in the ocean of Chit."
"When we have a dream, we make the objects an events we dream about to be possessed of independent existence, whereas they are merely the product of our brain. In like manner, when perceiving this external world through the sense we imagine it to be an independent reality, existing by itself and not as the product of the Divine Mind and Will, then verily our perception of the world may be fitly styled a dream. And it is exactly in this sense and only to this extent that the Vedanta likens the world to a dream."
Love emanates joy by reflecting on itself.
maya as being-from-will
The rich will always capture some portion of any advantage one tries to give the poor, because the rich are always in a better position to play the game for advantages than the poor are.
In Kipling, the Gods of the Market make three false promises: Peace without force; Life without restraint, and Prosperity without work.
Thinking politically and factionally comes so easy to human beings that we cannot consistently transcend the political and the factional without the four cardinal virtues.
Our actions are not merely affected by our desires but by the inertia that has to be overcome to pursue them.
three signs of tyranny: forcing people to violate the laws of religion; imposing taxes arbitrarily; preventing the political participation of the people
to participate in humanitarian traditions in such a way that the participation is a prayer
Christianity is
(1) corporate: Our
(2) familial: Father
(3) spiritual: who art in heaven
(4) directed to God: hallowed by Thy name
(5) evangelistic: Thy kingdom come
(6) historical: Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven
-- our petitions as individuals and small groups always occur within this context and with this understood
The fetus (a) belongs to the mother as part of her and from her; (b) belongs to the father as from him; and (c) has personal rights in his or her own right.
overlapping personal spheres and shared rights
self-harm // self-deception
Human beings do not merely have capabilities, they use them for ends according to the exercise of their rational capacities.
'Capitalism' is not itself a cause; when effects are attributed to it, they are always the effects of particular institutions or practices that are being classified as capitalistic, or else people are just making things up for rhetorical effect.
Societies are layers of classifications of activities.
the negotiation interpretation of logic and the impartial middleman
the ironic standpoint as the indefinite negative
Kirkegaard's Philosophical Fragments is an argument that any conception of truth beyond the Socratic starts to look Christian.
A truth can be viewed aesthetically, ethically, politically, religiously, etc.
an ethical commonwealth not merely governed by moral law but adequate to its sublimity
articulated premises + unarticulated/loosely articulated premises = probable inference
- the residual as capturable in terms of tendency (final) vs in terms of structural analogy (formal)
- the asserted vs the expected
"Bad poetry is false, I grant; but nothing is truer than true poetry." Peirce
The experience of the present is permeated by past and future; nothing is experienced as present except in light of memory and anticipation.
intelligibility ( referentiality ( functionality ( purpose
The ruling class in every epoch steals their ruling ideas from elsewhere. They do not arise from the material relations of the ruling class to others, which is why more or less the same groups are so often in the ruling class both before and after ideological revolutions. They assimilate the justifications of the invaders, or of the most stable institutions, or of whatever is convenient.
"No conclusion is trustworthy which has not been tried by enemy as well as friend; no traditions have a claim upon us which shrink from criticism, and dare not look a rival in the face." Newman
Feminist philosophy is a branch of history of philosophy as a discipline.
-- Charles Williams's suggestion that post-Reichenbach Falls Holmes is really Moriarty (in his review of Roberts's Dr. Watson)
Poetry is the preeminent form of language as mediation.
The primary purpose of courts is to provide public record of reasoning in decisions about law.
like Heimdallr
the human mind has nine mothers,
a shining god
upon a steed of burning gold
the liturgy as the symbolic depiction of the true common good
social media as general 'consciousness-raising'
-- never-ending 'clicks of recognition'
Everybody is put upon by somebody.
Inference to the best explanation requires prior establishment of possibility and of ability to explain.
"The great instrument of propagating moral truth is personal knowledge." Newman
"It may be true that the law cannot change the heart, but it can restrain the heartless." MLK, Jr.
Autonomy is something that must be grown into.
"The Catholic saints alone confess sin, because the Catholic saints alone see God." Newman
The test of whether you are really acting in righteous indignation rather than mere wrath is the golden rule.
in Euthyphro, the link between piety and making others better before the gods
superlegal, contralegal, and preterlegal forms of acting in a legal context
The indelible character makes us channels of grace.
the sacraments as templates of holiness
Thursday, July 09, 2020
Shame in the Gorgias
Shame plays a significant role in Plato's Gorgias. After Gorgias is backed into a corner by Socrates, Polus diagnoses Gorgias's mistake as one of shame (461b): Gorgias was ashamed to say what he actually thought, so he conceded things to Socrates that led to inconsistency. This leads to discussing whether oratory is admirable or shameful, with Socrates arguing that oratory is a kind of flattery, and therefore shameful. This in turn leads to discussing whether getting what you like is admirable or shameful, and Socrates' extremely important claim that doing bad is always worse than enduring it. Polus denies this, but as Socrates is able to get Polus to concede that doing wrong is at least more shameful, he is able to back Polus into a corner as well.
Callicles then diagnoses Polus's problem (482c-e): Polus also was too ashamed to say what he thought. More precisely, he claims there is a difference between natural justice and conventional justice, and Socrates is oscillating back and forth between the two in order to create awkward situations in which someone would have to say something that sounds shameful. And in natural justice, it is more shameful to endure evil than to do it; Polus, however, was stymied because in conventional justice the reverse is true. Socrates is really the one who should be ashamed, because practicing philosophy as a man is shameful (485b). The proof of Socrates's shameful state, in fact, is that somebody could bring him to trial and get him put to death, and he wouldn't be able to do anything about it.
The way Callicles had argued had suggested that he was putting himself forward as someone who could not be made ashamed of what he said. Socrates is able to prove that this is not true (494e); Callicles again tries to use shame as a weapon for herding Socrates, but Socrates isn't turned aside; Callicles cannot, in fact, maintain his distinction between natural justice and conventional justice. More importantly, he argues that while Callicles is right that his philosophy will lead to his death, this is not a matter of which to be ashamed. Only one thing is shameful: doing what's unjust (522e).
Thus there's a fundamental difference between how Socrates and how the orators see shame. For the orators, shame is a way to manipulate people, to herd them into a corner. This is why Callicles assumes that Socrates is trying to do this. But the orators come up against a wall in Socrates, because Socrates cannot be herded by shame. Believing that nothing is shameful except wrongdoing -- real wrongdoing, not even apparent wrongdoing -- Socrates cannot be manipulated. And it is also the secret to Socrates' consistency: only injustice is shameful, and therefore Socrates, who never stops considering justice and injustice, is really the man who can say what he really thinks.
Callicles then diagnoses Polus's problem (482c-e): Polus also was too ashamed to say what he thought. More precisely, he claims there is a difference between natural justice and conventional justice, and Socrates is oscillating back and forth between the two in order to create awkward situations in which someone would have to say something that sounds shameful. And in natural justice, it is more shameful to endure evil than to do it; Polus, however, was stymied because in conventional justice the reverse is true. Socrates is really the one who should be ashamed, because practicing philosophy as a man is shameful (485b). The proof of Socrates's shameful state, in fact, is that somebody could bring him to trial and get him put to death, and he wouldn't be able to do anything about it.
The way Callicles had argued had suggested that he was putting himself forward as someone who could not be made ashamed of what he said. Socrates is able to prove that this is not true (494e); Callicles again tries to use shame as a weapon for herding Socrates, but Socrates isn't turned aside; Callicles cannot, in fact, maintain his distinction between natural justice and conventional justice. More importantly, he argues that while Callicles is right that his philosophy will lead to his death, this is not a matter of which to be ashamed. Only one thing is shameful: doing what's unjust (522e).
Thus there's a fundamental difference between how Socrates and how the orators see shame. For the orators, shame is a way to manipulate people, to herd them into a corner. This is why Callicles assumes that Socrates is trying to do this. But the orators come up against a wall in Socrates, because Socrates cannot be herded by shame. Believing that nothing is shameful except wrongdoing -- real wrongdoing, not even apparent wrongdoing -- Socrates cannot be manipulated. And it is also the secret to Socrates' consistency: only injustice is shameful, and therefore Socrates, who never stops considering justice and injustice, is really the man who can say what he really thinks.
Wednesday, July 08, 2020
Four Poem Re-Drafts
Holy Dormition
A man in dream may fall asleep
and dream dissolve away,
for sleep may fade to waking light
as glory fills the day;
the dream within the dream will flow
to some bright, wakeful joy
as sleep itself will fall asleep
and, sleeping, be destroyed.
Faithless Summer
Fly from me, faithless summer, fly,
and give me no more alibis,
but flee my wrath, and take your lie
to some sad soul more like to cry.
You shall not turn me, though you try;
I care not for your whats and whys;
your soft, persuasive arts go ply
on some sad soul more like to cry!
You said you'd love me till you died,
but sought to give me cuckold's sighs;
now fly, you trothless summer, fly,
to some sad soul more like to cry!
Half Asleep in a Thunderstorm
I lie in bed at night,
a fan above my head;
my mind whirls round and round.
I dream that I am dead.
Darkness all around me
is a blanket on the brain,
my heartbeat in my ears
is the pounding of the rain;
I watch the world go by,
mere leaves upon the gale,
visions of lost time
untallied by a tale.
Darkness thunders softly
as I drift here in my bed,
half in the world and of it,
half out of it and dead.
Ashes and Clay
When the wordly wise seem to conquer,
when they scoff at the words on your tongue;
when they treat as though they were nothing
the chants your forefathers had sung;
when they speak as if Delphi's oracle
had told them of all secrets and ends,
as if each word their forked tongues were hissing
did from great Apollo descend;
then cast off their sophists' deductions
and of their white noise learn to say:
Your maxims are proverbs of ashes;
your defenses, defenses of clay.
They may take for their fashion the pompous,
or the dismissal of every decree,
or lace every word with a scorning
of things they don't bother to see.
They may boast of their goodness and virtue
or rejoice in their love of the poor
(whom they ignore every day in the passing
but as an abstraction adore).
They may contrast your life with disfavor,
but remember when hounds start to bay:
their maxims are proverbs of ashes;
their defenses, defenses of clay.
They will speak at great length of true justice;
they will condemn you for faults beyond ken;
they will hold you to standards of greatness
beyond the attaining of men.
And when it is done will they love you?
No, they hold you alone to the blame;
for you never did think as they think,
and your name was never their name.
When they do this, be strong and have courage;
a mirror hold up to their way,
for their maxims are proverbs of ashes,
their defenses, defenses of clay.
But beware when you speak to another;
beware of your word and your thought.
For you are not so wise in your knowledge
as never unwise to be caught.
You may speak with great understanding;
you may speak with the wisdom of years,
or know all the paths that the world takes,
or the grounds of each hope and all fears;
but always be mindful of danger,
how someone might face you to say:
"Your maxims are proverbs of ashes;
your defenses, defenses of clay"!
A man in dream may fall asleep
and dream dissolve away,
for sleep may fade to waking light
as glory fills the day;
the dream within the dream will flow
to some bright, wakeful joy
as sleep itself will fall asleep
and, sleeping, be destroyed.
Faithless Summer
Fly from me, faithless summer, fly,
and give me no more alibis,
but flee my wrath, and take your lie
to some sad soul more like to cry.
You shall not turn me, though you try;
I care not for your whats and whys;
your soft, persuasive arts go ply
on some sad soul more like to cry!
You said you'd love me till you died,
but sought to give me cuckold's sighs;
now fly, you trothless summer, fly,
to some sad soul more like to cry!
Half Asleep in a Thunderstorm
I lie in bed at night,
a fan above my head;
my mind whirls round and round.
I dream that I am dead.
Darkness all around me
is a blanket on the brain,
my heartbeat in my ears
is the pounding of the rain;
I watch the world go by,
mere leaves upon the gale,
visions of lost time
untallied by a tale.
Darkness thunders softly
as I drift here in my bed,
half in the world and of it,
half out of it and dead.
Ashes and Clay
When the wordly wise seem to conquer,
when they scoff at the words on your tongue;
when they treat as though they were nothing
the chants your forefathers had sung;
when they speak as if Delphi's oracle
had told them of all secrets and ends,
as if each word their forked tongues were hissing
did from great Apollo descend;
then cast off their sophists' deductions
and of their white noise learn to say:
Your maxims are proverbs of ashes;
your defenses, defenses of clay.
They may take for their fashion the pompous,
or the dismissal of every decree,
or lace every word with a scorning
of things they don't bother to see.
They may boast of their goodness and virtue
or rejoice in their love of the poor
(whom they ignore every day in the passing
but as an abstraction adore).
They may contrast your life with disfavor,
but remember when hounds start to bay:
their maxims are proverbs of ashes;
their defenses, defenses of clay.
They will speak at great length of true justice;
they will condemn you for faults beyond ken;
they will hold you to standards of greatness
beyond the attaining of men.
And when it is done will they love you?
No, they hold you alone to the blame;
for you never did think as they think,
and your name was never their name.
When they do this, be strong and have courage;
a mirror hold up to their way,
for their maxims are proverbs of ashes,
their defenses, defenses of clay.
But beware when you speak to another;
beware of your word and your thought.
For you are not so wise in your knowledge
as never unwise to be caught.
You may speak with great understanding;
you may speak with the wisdom of years,
or know all the paths that the world takes,
or the grounds of each hope and all fears;
but always be mindful of danger,
how someone might face you to say:
"Your maxims are proverbs of ashes;
your defenses, defenses of clay"!
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